A suspected terrorist attack near Paris Friday added to tensions across France as the nation prepares for more potential violence Saturday.
Seventy thousand law enforcement officers, along with helicopters, armored vehicles and water cannons, will be deployed across France as President Emmanuel Macron’s government tries to ward off another weekend of violent protests.
“The strategy adopted for the coming days is to ban protests requested by individuals or groups with no legitimate authority,” Macron said ahead of the weekend after canceling his planned trip to Nigeria and Senegal originally scheduled for next week.
“The rules are simple, and I think they’re just common sense,” Macron added. “The general recommendation is that there should be no demonstrations in the coming days.”
FRANCE’S MACRON BLAMES PROTESTS ON ‘ULTRA-LEFT GROUPS WHOSE AIM IS TO BRING DOWN THE REPUBLIC’
“Where trade unions submit requests to hold demonstrations, prefects will examine them in accordance with the law,” he added, “but alternative routes will be proposed” to protect city centers, businesses and public buildings.
Adding to security concerns, a suspected terrorist attack occurred in the city of Trappes, west of Paris. A 39-year-old man was arrested by police after one person was killed and four others, including a 12-year-old girl, were wounded in what was originally said to be a “relatively random” shooting.
Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez has since told local media, “The motive may be racist. The investigation is ongoing, but this is clearly a terrorist crime.”
The AFP reported the suspect appeared to fire randomly from a vehicle, and the mayor told reporters the dead victim and at least one of the wounded were “of African origin.”
Macron said “the nation is standing with” the victims of this “terrible ordeal.”
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Ahead of Saturday’s protests and after acknowledging that police had “lost control” during last weekend’s unrest, Nuñez, the interior minister, said his ministry is “ready for tomorrow. We will be extremely vigilant, extremely firm, and we will let absolutely nothing pass.”
Reuters reports that the Union Nationale des Étudiants de France, or UNEF, one of the nation’s oldest student unions, has said its planned rallies will go on as scheduled despite police rejecting their permit requests. Police have so far only approved a union demonstration in Paris, Reuters reported, while denying requests from UNEF and the “Yellow Vest” movement, an anti-establishment force that first emerged in 2018.
Macron also took aim at those he says are behind the violence, saying, “Last Saturday, we had political and seditious acts by ultra-left groups whose aim is to bring down the Republic.”
Earlier this week, Fabian Vanhemelryck, secretary general of the Alliance Police Nationale union, said political figures deserved blame because of “those who excuse the inexcusable, justify violence and prefer to overwrite police officers rather than condemn those who attack them.”
He also said the “state that abandons its police officers in the face of increasingly uninhibited violence, while demanding that they accept, remain(s) silent and continue(s) to hold the line.”
Major French institutions, like the Louvre and the Musée d’Orsay, will be closed in anticipation of Saturday’s planned protests, and 24 Metro stations across Paris will be closed. A Ligue 1 soccer match between Paris Saint-Germain and Olympique Lyonnais, scheduled for Sunday night at Parc des Princes in the capital, has also been postponed to Monday evening.
The NFL game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New Orleans Saints, scheduled for Sunday afternoon at Stade de France just north of central Paris, is still set to be played as scheduled, yet some weekend events around the game have been canceled.
The Stade de France is the same stadium that hosted an international soccer match between France and neighboring Germany during the Nov. 13, 2015 terror attacks.
Explosions were heard outside the stadium during the game that night, with then-French President François Hollande in attendance. Fans were held inside the stadium for hours while authorities dealt with the attacks unfolding around Paris that night.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.